


break through and smash some heads

by BridgetMcKennitt



Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: Competency, F/M, Flirting, Post-Captain America: Civil War (Movie), Rescue Missions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-08
Updated: 2016-07-08
Packaged: 2018-07-18 23:13:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,361
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7334515
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BridgetMcKennitt/pseuds/BridgetMcKennitt
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Now that she had resurfaced and found out what happened in her absence, Maria was <i>pissed</i>.</p>
            </blockquote>





	break through and smash some heads

**Author's Note:**

  * For [tielan](https://archiveofourown.org/users/tielan/gifts).



Officially, Maria had been on vacation. That's what the paperwork at Stark Industries said and Maria told everyone she couldn't wait to see Hawaii this time of year. Unofficially, she'd been traveling through Peru without access to communication to the outside world on assignment for Fury.

Now that she had resurfaced and found out what happened in her absence, Maria was _pissed_. Who wrote the Sokovia Accords in the first place? The wording was all over the place and there was plenty of room for misbehavior on both sides. Just reading through it made Maria want to hide her face in her hands. But that wasn't the biggest issue she came back to, not by a long shot.

Maria stared at the newspaper articles detailing the trouble the Avengers had gotten themselves into while she was gone. There was property damage, civilians injured, and half the team was in jail (the latter she had to hack into some systems to find _that_ out, but not where they were being held). She felt like she just entered a room on fire and there was no rhyme or reason to try and fix things. It was fortunate that an actual enemy was captured and thrown in jail as well and that it wasn't Bucky who attacked the UN event. No, this wasn't her official job anymore because she wasn't part of SHIELD, but she knew what she had to do and she didn't have a lot of time to do it either.

Maria immediately took some pills to stave off a future headache before calling Pepper.

Pepper answered on the second ring. "Hello?"

"Hey, Pepper, it's Maria. I'm back from my vacation and I saw the news." She wasn't going to mention Tony, not when Pepper and Tony had broken up recently. "What can I do?"

She heard Pepper let out a sigh of relief. "It's been a wildfire out here, to be honest. I've been having my people field calls the last few days. Can you come in and help out?"

"Of course." Maria picked up her blackberry as she began taking notes. "I'll be there in twenty minutes."

"Thank you. Oh, and Maria? Be careful. I don't know where in Hawaii you've been held up, but the world is out for blood and they're not looking at the Avengers in a good light recently."

"I was never an Avenger. You know that."

"No, but somehow word got out that Stark's isn't your only place of employment and that you're one of the staff at the New Avengers Facility."

Maria pursed her lips at that. It wasn't too big of a deal for that to be known, but it was going to make her job a lot harder because of it. Then again, now wasn't the time to deal in subtleties, not when she had a huge mess to clean up.

"I'm going to need your help, Pepper. A favor."

"Anything. What is it?" Maria stepped out onto the sidewalk and waited for her Uber ride.

"I'll let you know when I get there." She hung up the phone as her ride arrived and she got inside.

Her first stop was Pepper's new place. Maria paid her ride and hurried past Pepper's doorman with a nod. She reached Pepper's penthouse apartment and Pepper met her at the door. Pepper smiled at her and stepped inside to let her in.

"I'm sorry to pull you in like this, but it's been hectic," Pepper said as she closed the door. "Do you need me to catch you up on anything?"

"That's the thing. I need to find out where Steve is and the rest of the Avengers are currently being held. I know it's a prison, but I don't know the location."

Pepper nodded. "I can give you my access codes so you can look for them. I'm sure the knowledge is already deep in our databases."

"Thank you." Maria dug into her purse and pulled out a flash drive before offering it to Pepper. "I came across this while on my vacation. I think you'll find it helpful."

Pepper took the flash drive out of her hands as she nodded. "You're going to find a lot of pushback and not a lot of help out there. Everyone associated with the Avengers are under a microscope. They don't like what Steve did."

"I'm not surprised, but I'm not going to let him stand alone without any allies. I owe Steve that much."

"I know. We both do." Pepper led her to her computer. "Everything's ready for you."

She thanked Pepper as she sat down. First things first, she set up a program for Pepper's people to use to get through the latest wildfire. Then she began looking for the location of the Raft. If she knew Steve, and she did after years of working with him, he was going to try and rescue his team by any means. Well, she was one of those means and she wasn't going to let him down.

Tracking the Raft was easier than tracking down Steve's location. He'd gone to ground after Zemo was captured and Tony brought back Steve's shield. Steve wasn't a spy, but she taught him how to hide well. Maria smirked to herself as her fingers flew across the keyboard. Not that it was good enough to hide from _her_. It took an hour and some hacking, but she managed to find Steve. Now all she needed to do was contact him.

Maria wiped her tracks and signed off the computer. When she got up, Pepper was waiting for her.

"Got everything you need?" she asked as she offered Maria a cup of coffee.

She thanked Pepper as she accepted the cup and took a sip. Pepper always had the best coffee. "I did. I'm going to need a burner phone to contact Steve and give him the information I found."

Pepper opened a nearby drawer and offered a phone to her. "I keep a few around for cases like this." She smiled. "Just find Steve and get everyone out safely, okay?"

"Thank you, Pepper, for everything."

*

Maria headed to one of her own safe houses on the edge of town before attempting to make contact with Steve. He was hiding out in a rundown motel somewhere in Europe under a false name and she needed to talk to him. She left a voicemail on the answering machine in his room, pretending to be someone else, but giving him just enough information to contact her on her burner phone. She hung up and waited.

It didn't take long as her phone rang thirty minutes later. She picked up and tried to keep the irritation out of her voice. "You've really done it this time, Steve."

"Maria," he said after a pause. "I'm surprised you weren't in the thick of it when things went down."

"There wouldn't have _been_ any thick of it if I was there. Unfortunately for the both of us, I was traveling with no means of access to the outside world until I returned." She sighed. "I know where everyone is." She could tell that got his attention from the silence that followed. "It's going to be tough getting them out, but I have the information you'll need to make that journey easier."

"Why are you doing this? It won't do you any favors in the intelligence community if you help me."

"I know, but I covered my tracks and," she paused as she tried to word her next few sentences delicately. "Steve, it's you. I'm always going to have your back. Besides, I feel a little guilty. If I had been here instead of Peru, I could have made sure things didn't escalate the way they did."

Steve chuckled on the other end of the line and its honest sound warmed Maria to hear it. "You're a miracle worker, but not even you could have stopped this from happening the way it did."

"That's true. It is pretty hard to rein in the egos of so many stubborn men." Another chuckle from Steve. "I'll have everything you need to assault the Raft sent to you in the next few hours. I'll also coordinate your flight itinerary and meet you at the rendezvous point."

"You don't have to come with me. I can do it alone."

"You could, but two heads are better than one and I can't let our friends rot in jail like this. I promise, you'll be able to flex your muscles all you want against the guards and I won't interfere. I may even leer a little."

"Fair enough. Maria? Thank you for this. I appreciate it."

"You're welcome." They hung up and Maria leaned back in her chair. She had a lot to do and not a lot of time to do it. Their friends had been locked up for too long and she couldn't imagine how Wanda was handling imprisonment. She cracked her knuckles and got to work booking their flights.

*

Breaking everyone out was easier than Maria had expected. She hacked into the Raft's systems and turned off security so they could get inside. Steve took care of most of the guards while she covered his rear. It was going well, almost too well. By the time they reached the Avengers, Maria half expected the entire thing to be a trap and hundreds of guards were going to meet them with guns. Fortunately, that didn't happen.

She sat down at a terminal and began overriding the controls on the jail cells. Maria got in and, as soon as the doors slid open, Steve was right there helping Sam out. Maria went straight towards Wanda.

"Oh, Wanda. I'm so sorry," she said as she got out a knife and cut her loose. Maria helped Wanda to her feet before glancing at Steve. There was a strange look on his face, one that Maria hadn't seen before. She wanted to ask him about it, but this wasn't the time or place. "Steve, we gotta go. The Raft has been offline for too long."

"We need to grab our gear before we go," Sam said as he nodded to Scott. "I'm not leaving my wings or my falcon behind."

"Yeah. If I don't get my suit back, I'm going to get my ass kicked," said Scott as he looked around. "Where would they keep our stuff?"

Maria squeezed Wanda's hand before sitting back down at the terminal. It didn't her long to find out the location of their gear.

"We have five minutes to grab everything and go before reinforcements arrive," Steve said. "Let's move out."

*

They got back into the helicopter and Maria flew them to a safe house she acquired recently. She couldn't guarantee it was a hundred percent under the radar, but it was good enough for now. She offered Wanda a cup of coffee before walking through the house to find Steve. Maria found him on the second floor balcony overlooking the city and stood side by side with him.

"Penny for your thoughts?" she asked.

Steve glanced at her with a solemn expression on his face. "I was ready to go this far because I had to, but I wasn't expecting things to spiral out of control like it did."

"I can't say I disagree. We're in a pretty deep hole." She placed her arms on the balcony rail and leaned on them. "But that's life. One day you're doing the job you love and the next, you discover it's been infiltrated by Hydra and you have to take down your organization."

Steve snorted. "Yeah, that wasn't a good day either. I don't think you or I are meant for good days then."

"I don't know. I like to think we make our own good days. It's the simple moments that count." She couldn't help but smile as she glanced at him. "Every time I see you flex your muscles, I count that as a good day."

He chuckled. "Maria Hill, are you flirting with me?"

"I don't flirt. That's too nebulous for me. If I wanted your attention, I'd just ask you for it." She tilted her body towards him as she met his gaze. "Steve, would you like to go out on a date with me after the dust settles?"

He didn't look surprised, but then again, it wasn't like this was the first time he'd been asked out by women before. She waited patiently for a response. A yes or a no wasn't going to affect their professional relationship, Maria refused to let that happen, so she wasn't worried about that, but she hoped for a yes.

Steve was a pretty straight forward guy, so Maria was somewhat taken aback when he turned to her slightly and reached out to place his hand on top of hers before taking it in his. He brought her hand up to his lips and kissed the back of it.

"I don't think the dust's going to settle any time soon. In fact, I think it's only just begun once they realize we broke out our friends from the Raft and they can't find Bucky because he's frozen in Wakanda."

"I didn't know about that last part, but I can smooth that over since King T'Challa caught the real suspect who bombed the UN conference and killed his father. I know Bucky's your best friend." Steve continued holding her hand. She liked it.

"Thank you for that. You've always been there for me without fail. So while the dust isn't going to settle anytime soon, at least when we're out of immediate danger, I'd like to take you up on that offer for a date."

Maria couldn't help but feel warm at hearing those words. "There's a few hole in the walls that I think you'd appreciate. Cold beer, decent food."

"That sounds good." Steve looked back into the house. "We better get back inside before they start looking for us. But before we do," he broke off his words and leaned towards her.

When their lips met, Maria's first thought was _Finally_.


End file.
